


a series of (un)fortunate events

by bamfleur



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Canon Era, Castle of Lions - Freeform, Crack, Fluff and Humor, Hangover, I'm Bad At Tagging, Idiots in Love, Keith is still the red paladin, M/M, No Angst, No Smut, klance, space
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-23
Updated: 2020-03-23
Packaged: 2021-02-28 19:41:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,680
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23282695
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bamfleur/pseuds/bamfleur
Summary: If he survived all this, Keith would make sure to add ‘get drunk, make out with the person you hate the most, wake up hangover next to him, get a bloody nose, be trapped, and hide under his bed’ to the castle’s record of “torture methods throughout the galaxies”.or: the classic "I woke up in the wrong bed" -fic
Relationships: Keith/Lance (Voltron)
Comments: 1
Kudos: 38





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I don't have a beta reader and English is not my first language, so sorry for for any mistakes :) enjoy

Keith woke with a headache. A bad one.  
He felt groggy, his mind sluggish, but he forced himself to open his eyes. Blinking a few times, the world around him came slowly into focus, vague lines shifting into clearer lines. He closed his eyes and opened them again, repeating the action. The light of the lamp above him burned far too bright for his taste, a blinding sun in comfortable darkness, but he continued staring at it until his sight blurred. There was a pounding in his head, a muffled, but constant and annoying _thud thud thud_. Keith was sweaty and dehydrated, to sum it up: He felt like shit.

He continued staring at the ceiling, seconds or minutes or maybe hours ticking by, when he noticed that something… was off He wasn’t sure yet what it was exactly, but the longer he thought about it the more peculiar it became. He _really_ didn’t want to get up and leave the warm comfort of his bed – even if he sincerely needed headache tablets and some water for his desert of a mouth – but there was just something _different_. He scanned the ceiling again, letting his gaze wander over the seemingly perfect white surface. The lamp caught his eye. Still shining unpleasantly gaudy, but it was... Blue? Since when did he have a blue lamp? He searched his brain for an answer, but everything was hazy, a hidden mess. Did he maybe install a new one yesterday? Yesterday... Keith jolted up, immediately regretting it because his sight went black for a second. Yesterday, yesterday, yesterday... What had _happened_ yesterday? Drinking... There had been a lot drinking. A _fuckload_ of drinking. A game of truth or dare? Hunk emptying his stomach over Pidge? Allura drawing dicks on Shiro’s passed out face? Drunken fantasy memories, surely, because it just _couldn’t_ be true that Coran had attempted a strip-tease on the table.

  
When his eyesight returned and the black spots stopped dancing, he dared to slowly look around. Where the hell was he? Ruffling his black hair, he tried to concentrate. The room, though similar to his own, was definitely different. White, and simply furnished, with no unnecessary decorations. The closet was on located on the wrong side as opposed to his quarters, and there was a pin board full of pictures on the wall. Keith couldn’t make out the smiling faces from the distance, but he knew he did not own any pictures. He did own a houseplant though – Well, technically it was more of a spaceship-plant – but it was nowhere to be seen. There were clothes strewn across the floor, a blue jeans, a black T-shirt, and… Wait- Was that his jacket? He looked closer and saw that it could only be his one and only favourite red one. _What the fuck?_  
Keith tried to remember, but every time he tried to grasp a thought, it fled again. It was like trying to swim through a crystalizing pool of honey, and when he finally neared the edge, he got stuck. The taste of alien alcohol was really all that remained in his mind. Groaning, he pushed himself more upright.  
A sudden memory flashed through his mind.  
 _Brown hands roaming over his body, the scent of the ocean clouding his thoughts, Lance pushing him against the wall_ \- What? Lance?? His head whipped around, heart suddenly pounding, searching for what he was afraid to find. And there he was- Insufferable, annoying Lance _lying freaking next to him_ , asleep, _shirtless._

  
Keith made a screeching sound, before literally _jumping_ out of the bed. His body and mind protested protested as he clumsily fell to the floor, but he didn’t care and scrambled away as fast as possibly until his back hit the wall. He tried to catch his breath. All the movement made him want to puke, but he forced it down and just sat there, staring at the biggest impossibility in the universe. Which was that he had woken up in fucking _Lance McClain’s bed_. He gulped dry air into his even drier throat, not exactly sure what to do. His lips felt swollen - Why, he didn’t even want to think about it. He shuddered a bit and looked down, realizing with a horrible feeling that he was shirtless too. At least he still had his underpants on, that meant nothing more had happened... Right? _Shit, shit, shit._ This just couldn’t be true. Okay, he had always thought how ridiculously hot Lance sometimes looked. But just because he appreciated his looks did definitely not mean that he would ever make out with that unnerving git! He was above that!

It was true that over course of the last few weeks they had shifted into something of a deeper friendship, beginning to feel more comfortable in each other’s presence. Yes, Keith would even go as far as to trust Lance with his life – but all this didn’t stop him from wishing Lance to hell and back sometimes. Keith knew his temperament flared up easily, but there was just something about the blue paladin could light it in seconds. One word or a simple look was enough to make his blood boil. And now that person was only a few metres away, sound asleep with his mouth open and brown hair sticking up in all four cardinal directions. He kind of looked cute.  
Keith wanted to smack himself. This was possibly one of the worst moments to think about things like that, especially when he felt as if a hammer was constantly pounding nails into his head. God, he would never drink again. _Focus, focus._ He only really had two options - Wake Lance, or flee.  
Now, Keith wasn’t usually the “being a coward” type of person, but when it came to things like these - Emotions, and, god forbid, _feelings_ \- he always ran. He had ran that first time when he was six, he had ran from his foster families all the times after that, and he would sure as hell run now too. So, fleeing the scene and trying to forget this ever happened, was the way Keith would choose. For a second he allowed himself to imagine other possible scenarios, but every fibre of his being screamed _Hell no!_ at the thought of having to confront Lance. Except his dick maybe.  
Ignoring his body’s protests and the dizziness in his head, he got up. The world swayed a bit, left to right and right to left, but he managed it somehow. _Just don’t puke, Keith_. He quickly scrambled to get his discarded clothes and rushed to the door, not even looking back. He had to get out, out, out.  
Expecting the automatic doors to open, (thoughts way too preoccupied to think about trivial things like watching his steps), he ran forward - and straight into it, hitting his foot hard. He didn’t even have time to be astonished about the fact that he seemed to have become so privileged to Altean technology that his usual reflexes were all for nothing– because he fell forward, and crashed face-first into the door.

“Ouuff!” Keith made a pained sound as his nose hit the white material and he doubled over, hands shooting up to his face when the pain exploded. Blood rushed out.“Fucking spaceshit!” (Note: They once found those silver stones on an abandoned planet, and they might have looked cool if they didn’t smell like - well, shit. You could always trust Pidge to name a thing correctly.) Colourful stars and spots were busy whirring behind his eyes like mad Ferris wheels, and the metallic taste in his mouth did nothing to help with his up-building urge to gag. _Breath, breath, breath_. Trying to ignore the pain, he carefully touched his nose and nearly cried of relief that nothing was broken. At least he wouldn’t have to go to the healing pod. On that note – Could healing pods cure a hangover? It was certainly worth a try.  
But why hadn’t the door opened? With one hand still holding his nose, he banged the other fist against the white material, but the door remained silent and unmoving. “Open up-”

_They barely made it to Lance’s room. Lance didn’t want to stop touching Keith, and Keith was just as eager to respond. When they finally made it through the door, Lance was already on him, pushing him against the wall, kissing him. “What if-”, Keith breathed through the kisses, “Someone comes in.” Lance let go of him and grinned. “¡No hay problema, mullet boy!” He went to the door and tipped something in on the control screen next to it. After some seconds, he turned back at Keith. “It’s locked. The only way to get in and out of this room is through my magic hand.” He wiggled his fingers. Keith rolled his eyes. Then Lance was back with a few steps of his impossible long legs, and he hungrily kissed him again. Keith pushed his body against him, both nearly tumbling over in their drunken state-_

Keith felt his cheeks heat up at the sudden memory, but at least it explained the locked door. Holy quiznak, he was so fucked. Would he have to wait until Lance would wake up? Keith didn’t even want to imagine the awkwardness. “Uhm hi there, so we made out yesterday because we were drunk and I woke up in your bed, but I don’t actually remember what happened. Your door gave me a bloody nose because I wanted to escape and I have a splitting headache and might puke any second, so yeah, how you doin’? You're still an ass.” Yeah, right.  
So, there he was- Clothes in his arms, bloody face, feeling like somebody wanted to crack his brain open. And blood was _still_ coming out of his nose. He regretted having worn a white T-shirt the day before, but he pressed it against his face anyway. The white cotton smelled like alcohol and cigarettes. He glanced at Lance, who emitted a soft snoring, and against his will a small smile crept on his face. He looked like an adorable Latino baby owl. Keith had to resist the urge to run his fingers through the other boy’s hair. He could imagine that it smelled good. Lance’s dozen beauty products had to have some benefits, surely. Not that he wasn’t blessed with handsome features already. Flawless skin, a sharp jaw, eyes like the ocean, boy, those legs - Wait - did he just say something? Carefully stepping a bit closer, he tried to hear more clearly what Lance was mumbling in his sleep.  
“Key...” Keys? Keel? “Key... Keith. Keith.”  
 _Oh my god._  
Keith was sure in that moment he would have lost a redness competition against a red light. Because Lance was talking in his sleep. About him. About _Keith._  
He felt his heart speeding up.  
A part of him tucked the information away for relentlessly teasing Lance about it later.  
The other, sadly alcohol-fried part, tried to process this new information. Lance McClain, the most annoying brat to ever walk the earth - Correction: Whoever flew through the universe - dreamed about him. Were they fighting? Or was it... Another kind of dream completely. With Keith doing... things to him. The thought alone let Keith’s body catch fire, parching his already dry mouth to dust. Because yes, he hated to admit it, but the blue lion’s pilot was a quite frequent visitor in his dreams. He tried not to think about it too much. Imagining Lance’s sinful lips wrapped around his dick did exactly nothing to help improve his situation. Currently: Shirtless, hangover and bloody, trapped in another person’s room.  
Would they resume their normal fighting and bickering? Would they stop talking to each other? Would things be uncomfortable? He hoped not, though he couldn’t really imagine a _not_ \- awkward way out of this.  
God, somehow Keith wished he had been the one to wake up later so he wouldn’t have had to deal with all this. His only hope was that Lance wouldn’t remember a single thing, really. That way he could bury all this in some far, forgotten corner of his brain and forget it ever happened.  
Suddenly Lance groaned, and his eyelashes fluttered.  
For a second Keith stood frozen, his brain short-circuiting. And then, he really only did the most rational thing to do in his opinion.  
Keith dropped to the floor like a stone and crawled under the bed.


	2. Chapter 2

In hindsight, this might not have seemed like the best idea. It later turned out to be one of the worst he ever had. But right now, Keith congratulated himself for his brainwave.

Avoid Lance? - Check. Crawl into a dark space of shame to hide his tomato face? - Check. Even with the embarrassment settling in his bones, Keith still felt like a genius. He didn’t even care about the few long-lost, stinking socks or the empty water bottle, which was squished between his body and the wall, or all the dust. His nose had stopped bleeding and although he still felt as if having been pulled through a washing machine, the pain in his head had dulled a bit. Trying to make as little noise as possible, he pushed some socks out of his face for more air and settled into a more comfortable position. All he had to do now was wait until Lance was out of the room (He bet his right arm that that idiot would forget to lock the door), and then he would be out of this hell. He could almost smell his freedom. The answer had been so simple, the glorious solution to all his problems- Hide! So Keith waited.

And waited.

And waited.

How fucking long did that snail take to finally get up?

Keith looked out over the floor room, mind slowly getting bored and thoughts drifting around. He was thirsty. He needed to piss. Drinking too much the night before had that side-effect. Lance was such an... Overcooked spaghetti. Lazy sea cucumber? Salty butter? He had never been very good with swearwords. Not like Pidge, who threw them around with a kind of awe-strucking grace and fluency. Keith let his eyes wander around in the half-dark, maybe he could find a forgotten tablet to pass the time. Some headphones for music would be nice. Or another pillow, lest he should fall back to sleep. He turned his head to look at Lance’s clothes on the floor, remembering that he, out of all people, was the one who had undressed him. He even felt a tiny bit proud of that, even if, given his current situation, it was just awkward. _Idiot_. He looked at the blue jeans, which were unzipped, and vaguely remembered how he had been all hot and cold and hot and cold as he unbuckled a belt and… Keith noticed something red on the white carpet.

It was... A red spot? No... Oh no, no, no, no.

_Motherfucking expired chicken soup!_

Why hadn’t he seen that sooner? With dreading realization Keith came to the conclusion that it was a stain. A blood stain. And of course, it wasn’t only one stain. It was a trail. A trail, that if followed, led straight to his hideout. Keith felt like Gretel, but not Hensel would be the one to find the breadcrumbs, but his worst nightmare. Shit, he had to get out of here. Fast. Maybe Lance had simply woken up for a second before, but had fallen back asleep? He listened to the breathing rhythm above him, it was as steady as ever.

Keith waited another small eternity, gathering his courage to make a run for the wardrobe. It was probably just five minutes, but it felt like forever. In combat or battle, all his nerves and reflexes were taut like a brow string, ready to fight and make decisions in milliseconds. Now however, it took all his willpower to not let that ridiculous fear of being found by Lance overwhelm him. Keith gritted his teeth. If the wardrobe was like his own, it was big enough to hide him… He just needed to crawl like four metres, open the door and –

“Ughhh”, groaned somebody.

Keith wished he had never been born.

Lance made some noises and Keith could picture him stretching, the movement making the mattress sag in. More movement above him, then two feet planted themselves on the floor, centimetres away from Keith’s face. He remained as still as possible, trying to control the wave of panic that threatened to overflood him. Because of course Lance had chosen this exact moment to fully wake up, _of course._

He was trapped.

 _Please let him be too hangover to notice the blood stains. Please._ Keith had never been very religious, and if there truly was a god or any powerful creature out there, Keith sure as hell never had the time to think about them. There was always something to fight, to work on, to distract him. But now Keith found himself praying to all the gods, and everything that existed, to make him invisible. The thought of _Lance_ finding him _under his bed-_ It was so ridiculous and embarrassing, Keith couldn’t even think about it. He would rather face the whole of the Galra empire on his own. He could see Lance slowly standing up, seemingly leaning on the wall for support. He would have smirked if the threat of Lance discovering him hadn’t been so realistic. At least now he knew that Lance wasn’t as prone to alcohol and its after-effects as he always boasted. Because _he_ sure as hell felt them, and being squished under a bed with dirty laundry and tons of dust sure did not help to reduce the constant pain in his head. And he really, _really_ needed to pee. If he survived all this, Keith would make sure to add ‘get drunk, make out with the person you hate the most, wake up in his bed the next morning, have a hangover, get a bloody nose, be trapped, and hide under his bed’ to the castle’s record of “torture methods throughout the galaxies”.

He held his breath as he saw Lance’s feet slowly shuffling over the floor - over the bloody trail on the carpet- in direction bathroom. Keith slowly exhaled. So far, so good. But he didn’t dare come out yet, he would wait until Lance would close the bathroom door and then he would try to break the world record in 4m crawling.

He watched Lance tiredly stepping into the bathroom- and _not closing the door!_ Keith was so shocked (because which monster didn’t close their bathroom door?), for a moment he didn’t even realise what Lance was doing.

The blue paladin was undressing. And he only wore his boxers in the first place.

Keith gaped. He couldn’t believe that he was seeing Lance McClain in all his butt-naked glory. Sure, he had checked out Lance’s ass before, but since he could always only steal a few quick glances, he never really had appreciated it enough. And boy, that butt was to be appreciated! He wondered briefly if Lance went to nude beaches, because everywhere he looked Lance was evenly and smoothly tanned in that honey-caramel-chocolate colour of his. Closing his mouth to not feel like a fish, he watched with a mix of relief and regret as Lance stepped into the shower and didn’t turn around. Soon white steam filled everything up, and most of Lance’s brown skin vanished into the thick of the cotton candy. Keith could still make out the shape though, and just maybe he didn’t move immediately to get a bit more time to admire the view. It was all, of course, for tactical purposes like planning the perfect moment to escape.

What he failed to reckon with though, was that Lance would start humming, and then singing.

_Could you be loved_

_and be loved?_

The words rolled smoothly off Lance’s tongue. Keith immediately recognized Bob Marley’s song – not that he listened much to reggae, but just once curiosity might have gotten the better of him and he sneaked a look at Lance’s open left playlist, scanning through the songs and later listening to some of them. But his voice was - good? To Keith’s surprise, Lance hit all the tones rightly, his voice clear and loud yet with its own kind of richness.

_“Could you be loved_

_and be loved?”_

Never in a million light years, he would have thought that that conceited goose could sing. Sing, in a way that wouldn’t make you want to cut your ears off! He listened, kind of awe-struck.

_“Don't let them fool ya-”_

Through the steamed over shower glass he saw Lance’s hips swaying with the rhythm of his words. Who in Shiro’s name _danced_ in the shower?

_“Or even try to school ya, oh, no-”_

Finger drumming against the wall, tongue clicking.

_“We've got a mind of our own_

_So go to hell if what you're thinking is not right-”_

Okay, yes, Keith admitted it. Lance singing was something he thoroughly enjoyed (and it had nothing to do with... You know. Nakedness. Or butt-appreciation).

_“Love would never leave us alone_

_A-y in the darkness there must come out to light”_

Lance’s body still moving in a way that was Keith definitely _not_ turning on.

_“I made out with Keiith,_

_Keith Kogane”_

Humming.

_“I made out with Keiith,_

_Keith Kogane”_

_Oh. Shit._

Keith was on fire. His insides felt like a hot bubbling pot. _Seems like Plan “Hope that Lance doesn’t remember a thing about yesterday” falls into the water. Ice cold water. With the speed of light._ Not only was the blue paladin murmuring his name in his sleep, _he was singing! About him! In the shower!_ There were a hundred thoughts rushing through his mind as if carried by a frantic wind, but he could only really hold on to one thing in the storm: Did Lance actually... like him? That he wasn’t just another drunk guy to be made out with - Not that there were many opportunities for that in this space castles- but that he _meant_ something to Lance? The way Lance meant so much to Keith, more than he allowed himself to admit. Like all the fights in which Keith always stuck unnecessary close to the blue lion, just in case something happened. Or the way Pidge made fun of him for always staring at Lance for maybe a second too long. Or how he always stayed longer in the training area than necessary, in the hope that Lance would come over and get him. Or the simple fact that he may or not may have the biggest crush on Lance McClain. He could have gone on, citing hundreds of little stupid things he did when it came to that certain pilot, but in that second, he was firstly too struck by the fact that Lance was _singing_ about their make-out _naked_ in the shower, and secondly, as the horrible realization dawned on him, there was a big, fat, ugly spider sitting before him.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is honestly getting way longer than I ever expected, but hey! I don't think I've ever managed to creatively write so much in my life lol. Sorry if I'm getting anything in the timeline wrong, I can barely remember the earlier seasons, and I only finished season 8 yesterday, can you believe? rip allura, she deserved better :(  
> (Also, I didn't know either that spiders could purr, but some of them can.)

\---

Keith and spiders were not something that combined well. To be more accurate, Keith _hated_ spiders with a burning passion. There were few things he was afraid of, and even fewer things he admitted to himself to be scared of. Spiders, however, were one of them. His life had been carefree and happy, or at least, as carefree and happy as one could get as an orphaned street rat, until that night where little eight-year old Keith Kogane had woken up in the middle of the night because something had tickled his face. The something had not lived through the following fight, but the nightmares had stayed.

The spider he was currently facing seemed to originate directly from them. It was huge, nowhere near the size of a normal spider, with eight glowing blue eyes and hairy white legs. It had a dark shimmering body as if coated in oil, and there was a sort of deadly elegance about the way it sat, ironically reminding him of Allura. Keith decided it was Altean.

 _Great._ He was probably facing a direct descendant from one of the spiders which sneaked their way onto the ship ten thousand years ago. He would never complain about earth spiders again.

The Altean spider was sitting emotionless on its ugly eight legs, only centimetres from his nose away. It was looking at him in a calculating way, as if planning an attack. It most _definitely_ planned to attack. Those glowing eyes meant death or survival. Keith felt like in a western duel, except he was facing no ordinary human and in his current situation, was clearly the inferior being. Letting out a shallow breath, he could feel sweat trickling down the side of his head. Through his fog of nearing panic, he could also hear Lance humming, but it felt distant. Every inch of his body was tense. Combat-ready. And then the spider fucking _moved._

Keith screamed and chaos ensued.

His fighter reflexes kicked in faster than ever before. Not even caring that he bumped his head hard on the bed above him, which multiplied his headache tenfold, he rolled over his left shoulder and then out of his hiding space over the carpet, jumping up and on to the bed as if the floor were molten lava. No spider was following, but he could swear one of its hairy legs had touched his nose.

His scream hadn’t quite left his throat yet, when the shower door opened. Lance came running out of the bathroom, stark naked with a toothbrush in his hand, looking ready to save a damsel in distress. Instead of a damsel, Lance was presented with a certain raven-haired paladin, standing on his bed and looking like he had just fought death himself.

They both let out a yell.

 _If this were a sitcom this would have been a hilarious scenario._ The thought rushed to Keith’s mind and was gone before he had even registered what was happening. _Two screaming boys face each other in a room..._ It sounded like the beginning of a bad joke. That didn’t change the fact though that he had a) just escaped certain death, but which was probably still looming underneath the bed, b) everything hurt and he was quite possibly dying, and c) Lance was standing naked in front of him.

“Keith?!”

Lance had stopped screaming and was trying to cover up his... parts. It was too late for that though, Keith had seen _everything._ His heart was racing, and he could not say if it was from his near-death experience or the boy in front of him. Closing his gaping mouth and trying to look not as stunned, hangover and embarrassed as he probably did, he tried to gather himself. He wasn’t sure if he could get a single word across his lips.

“Uhm...”, he cleared his throat. His mouth was so dry it hurt when speaking. “There’s a spider underneath your bed.” _Really, Keith? That’s the thing you chose to say?_

Lance stared at him. Keith could see the tiny droplets of water trickling down his smooth brown neck.

“Uh. You – what? Uhm. Ok, yeah. Let me- let me just get a towel. Could you maybe-”, Lance’s stuttered, cheeks aflame, and he looked pointedly to the wall. Keith hastily turned around, screaming internally. No, he hadn’t stopped screaming internally since the very moment he woke up. He would choose fighting an army of Galra ships any time over a situation like this. This whole thing was ridiculous! Breathing in a few deep breaths, he leaned against the wall for support, his head suddenly swimming.

Alien Vodka, never again.

\---

Shortly after, he heard footsteps coming out of the bathroom, but he did not dare to look yet. The image of a screaming, naked Lance was still too vivid. Seconds passed. Precious, precious seconds for Keith in which he had more time to figure what exactly to say, but truth to be told, he had no idea. His hangover made it hard to get any clear thoughts except _Fuck. Fuck. I need to piss. There’s a spider underneath me. Fuck. Don’t puke. I need to drink something. Fuck. I just saw Lance naked. Holy Shiro._

“Keith.”

Keith finally turned around, praising every god in the universe when he saw that Lance had a towel securely wrapped around his hips. Stupid Lance, always looking so stupidly good.

“Lance. Uh.” He paused for an awkward moment. One _awkward moment? Ha! This whole ordeal had been just one awkward moment after the next._

“You might be wondering – I mean, I can explain… Look, yesterday, we might have –“

He couldn’t finish his sentence.

Lance made an indefinable sound – like he had just swallowed a toad – and, faster than you could say “Quiznak”, Lance had run in Keith’s direction and jumped on the bed. Keith let out a yelp, nearly losing his balance as the mattress sagged in and the bed squeaked under their combined weight. He stumbled, and for a second feared this would be the _second_ time in one morning that his alcohol-plagued body would crash into something, but he managed to regain his balance.

“What the hell, Lance!“

The other boy only whirled around and pointed to the floor. Keith followed his outstretched finger, and of course, that horrifying monster of a spider was there, scuttling over the carpet. It was easily as big as a football. Keith shuddered involuntarily.

“Do you… think it can jump?”, Lance whispered, without taking his eyes from the giant arachnid. He seemed to have forgotten that Keith had seen him naked only seconds ago, or the fact that he had sung about making out with him, or at least the spider was a more pressing matter right now. Keith thanked all the gods for the distraction, even if it came in form of a living nightmare.

“I… don’t think so. The legs look too thin to support such a heavy body”, he said.

Lance nodded slowly but didn’t answer. He looked at the spider, which had stopped moving, its eight ugly eyes set on the bathroom. It seemed to consider his next move, searching for the one who had dared to interrupt its slumber.

Keith dreaded the confrontation, but suddenly was also keenly aware how close the other boy was.

“What now?”, Lance asked under his breath, his back still turned to him, but still way too much in his personal space. Keith could feel the warmth radiating of his body.

“I don’t know.”, Keith said.

“What do you mean you don’t know?”

“It means that I don’t know.”

“But _you_ are always the one with a plan.”

“No, I’m not. That’s Pidge. Or Shiro.”

There was a short silence. The spider remained still, and Keith internally thanked the universe that it had not spotted them yet. Sure, he had said that it could not jump, but it had been more to reassure himself and calm his frayed nerves.

“Then… fight it.”, Lance said, genius that he was.

“How am I supposed to fight _that_?”

“Pshh! Not so loud. I don’t know. Fighting is your thing.”

“Yes, against _Galra._ Not Altean death spiders.”

“You are half- Galra. Shouldn’t it be like, in your blood to fight against Alteans?”

“That’s racist, Lance.”

“Well, if we say that Galra kill everything and everyone, everything and everyone becomes equal to them, or not? So, technically speaking, you could kill it simply because it presents another species which doesn’t confirm to your Galra rules and-“

Keith cut him off, trying to repress his rising annoyance. How could he crush so hard on a guy when that same guy managed to vex him _all the damn time_?

“I will not move one foot near that thing. Aren’t _you_ the sharpshooter?”

“Does it look like I have a weapon? Not everybody sleeps with their goddamn laser-shooter under the pillow, Keith.”

Keith’s could feel the heat rising to his cheeks, and oh, he had an answer so ready on his tongue - hot singing Cuban boys be damned – when Lance’s breathing stocked, and he turned around fully for the first time, meeting Keith’s eyes. The bed shifted under his movement. _Fuck me,_ Keith thought, all words dissolving into nothingness. The blue of Lance’s eyes reminded him of an ocean, too intense and beautiful to be legal. He wanted to drown in them. – _Stop it! Idiot._

“What?”, he snapped instead, as loudly as he dared and maybe sharper than intended, but he needed to distract himself. The scent of Lance’s shampoo was getting to his head, reminding him that he probably smelled like sweat and smoke.

Lance looked at him as if he were the key to all secrets of the universes, and then, to Keith’s confusion, a faint blush appeared on his cheeks.

“Well”, he said slowly, “Not everybody does, but _you_ do.”

“So what if I do! It’s not like I –“ Keith broke off, mid-air, suddenly catching on the implication. Lance suddenly seemed very interested in the bed sheets, intently staring down and refusing to meet the red paladin’s eyes. Keith was glad. His own head probably looked as if dipped in red paint. He also didn’t trust his voice, so he just settled on clearing his throat and turned around swiftly, bending down to reach under the pillow, hoping that it was there and at the same time hoping it was _not_ there, because that definitely, one hundred percent meant that whatever happened last night _had happened,_ and there was no way around it. And that’s without taking into consideration how fucked up he truly must be to put a goddamn knife under the pillow of his make-out, even when he was drunk. _I might have some issues to work on, yeah._

His fingers touched cold steel, and Keith couldn’t decide if the sigh that escaped him was one of relief or pain. He straightened up again, careful not fall – quiznak, did that hangover screw with his balance – and turned around, facing Lance again. The other boy saw the blade of Marmora in his hand, and to Keith’s surprise a huff of laughter escaped him. “I can’t believe…” Lance shook his head. “Doesn’t matter. We have to kill that monstrosity before it kills _us.”_ With that he motioned to the spider, which, to its credit, was perfectly still in the same position as before.

Keith cleared his throat. “Right. Just- let’s not talk about this ever again?”

Lance raised an eyebrow. “We can drop that you slept with your goddamn knife under my pillow, but we will _definitely_ have a talk, Kogane.”

What would this future “talk” mean for them? The implication made his heart flutter, but there was also that dark abyss of rejection waiting. Either way, Keith knew there was no way around it anymore. He held the blue pilot’s gaze for a second, trying to read his face, before just nodding shortly. “Ok.” He first had to deal with the other enemy in the room.

Keith’s s plan so far was: 1) Kill Altean death spider 2) ??

There was no plan when it came to Lance. Yesterday alcohol had taken care of making decisions for him, but today he had to face the consequences.

Keith exhaled slowly, tearing his eyes away from Lance and onto the spider. It was sitting facing the closet, silently rubbing its front legs like a fly. The act gave it a wicked aura, as if it were an evil mastermind. It probably was.

“I’m not sure if I’ll be able to do this. I feel like shit.”, he said.

“Hey, you’re Keith Kogane, paladin and member of the blade of Marmora! You’ve pretty much nailed every physical fitness test in existence. You’ll be able to throw a little dagger.”

Hearing those words was unusual and warmed something inside him. Between their constant fights, he could not remember ever receiving an actual compliment from Lance. He liked it though.

Keith pushed distracting thoughts and the dizziness in his head to the side and tried to find the iron calm he used when in battle - though he had never been hangover in battle before. God, why had he been so _careless_ with the drinking yesterday? He knew his limits, and when to stop. Usually.

_Okay, okay, okay. I can do this. Just throw it. Simple. Steady and sure. Steady and sure…_

Keith found his balance, reached back, and threw.

The blade whirled through the air and landed with a precise _thud_ dead centre in the dark body, accompanied by an ugly squirting sound. Black blood sprayed. The spider shrieked, as far as spiders could shriek, swaying under the heavy weight of the weapon. It shuddered, looking like it was trying to shake off the weapon, but it just made blood ooze out of the wound. The motion left pools of dark liquid on the beige carpet, which from a bird-eye perspective displayed a bizarrely pretty pattern of dried red and black spots.

“Got it.” Keith could not quite keep the satisfaction out of his tone. At least he was not completely useless in his current state. “I will accept a _thank you, Keith,_ now _._ You’re welcome.”

Lance opened his mouth, clearly not prepared to say thank you, when a sort of frantic purring started up from the spider. The sound raised all his hackles, and Keith could see goose bumps form on Lance’s arm. Both boys stared at the creature, banned in morbid fascination. Its whole body was quivering, making the blade of Marmora look like it was stuck in jelly. The purring intensified, growing higher and louder in volume, and the sight got more grotesque as the arachnid turned in circles, as though performing a little dance. Finally, it sluggishly scuttled over the floor and vanished into bathroom.

Without wasting a second, Lance jumped from the bed and ran straight after it. He slammed his hand on the control panel next to the bathroom, making the slide doors shut close. The locked signal beeped, and the nightmare spider was trapped.

Keith sighed of relief as he felt an invisible weight lifted from his shoulders. _Spiders. Ugh._

You could still hear that bloodcurdling noise from the other side, but it was weaker now, barely audible. After some time, it stopped completely.

“Do you think you killed it?”, Lance asked.

“Not sure. I won’t be disappointed if I did.”

“Me neither.”

There was a moment of silence.

Keith wanted to say something, but then found out he didn't know where to start. He looked at Lance, who was still in his towel, and he thought about himself, bloody and hangover and in his briefs standing on his crush’s bed in a magic castle flying through space. He felt something rising in his chest - a giggle, born in the madness of a drunken person. It welled up to a flood of merriment, and suddenly he couldn’t hold it in anymore, so he burst out laughing, an unfamiliar sound that filled the room.

Lance looked at him in disbelief, but soon a grin slowly spread on his face. “I think I must be dreaming.”, he said. Keith couldn’t even answer, and after a second Lance joined him, the whole comicality of the situation being too much.

Every time one of them started to calm down, they just looked at each other and a new fit of laughter overtook them, bridging all awkwardness and embarrassment of the morning. Keith could not remember ever laughing like that before. It was a weird feeling, in the best way – he had no control over his body, his voice, his face, as he shook with wave after wave of laughter, gasping for air, and the only thing that made it better was Lance laughing with him. They laughed and laughed and laughed, and if Zarkon himself had shown up, he couldn’t have stopped them, caught as they were in a rare moment of unfiltered happiness.


End file.
